The Slave Series

by Laura Frances

  “You have me,” I whisper. “You have me. I will be your family. Please.” I swallow. “Please come back. I need a family, too.”

  There is so much to live for, especially now that the people are uniting with the Watchers. When I think of the transformation, see the life flickering in the eyes around me, warmth pours into my heart. I feel it, like a swallow of warm drink on a cold night. It ignites my chest and spreads to my belly. It’s like the warming packet from Cash in the alley. It is Edan’s warm hand on my shoulder, his side against mine when he pulls me close.

  I hold the child to my chest and hope that I can communicate that same warmth to his heart.

  “You are mine,” my shaky voice whispers by his ear. I didn’t plan this when I decided to visit him. I didn’t know that my heart would have tethered itself without my knowledge. I didn’t know how much I needed him.

  23

  “Hannah.”

  A heavy hand shakes my shoulder. I gasp, sitting up fast. Beside me, Aspen shifts and groans.

  “It’s okay,” the voice whispers. “It’s me.”

  I expect to see Edan, but that isn’t his voice. When I turn, I can barely make out Cash’s blond hair.

  “I want to…show you something,” he whispers, sounding a little unsure. I nod and try to stand, but Aspen turns, and my feet tangle in the blankets. I reach out, gripping Cash’s arms for support. His hands grab my elbows to steady me, and we’re frozen like this for a moment. I can’t see his face, not really. This room is dark without skylights. But his heavy breathing tells me that he’s nervous about something.

  “You okay?” he whispers.

  “Yeah.” I untangle my feet and straighten, letting go of his arms.

  “Grab your boots.”

  I have to hold his wrist to make it through the jumble of sleeping bodies. In the hall, my grip loosens and falls.

  “What is it?” I ask. Worry tries to stir in my belly. But the longer we stand here, with very little activity going on around us, the less I think something is wrong.

  Cash hesitates. He seems to consider something for a moment, then he’s ducking into the sleeping room again. I stand in the hall alone, swaying with the strain of a deep yawn. When Cash returns, he’s holding my coat.

  “You’ll need this.”

  “Why?” I yawn again.

  “It’s cold.”

  “Okay. But my bed was warm.”

  “This way,” Cash says, ignoring me with a smile. “Trust me.”

  He slides his hand into mine, and I forget. I forget why I was ever tired; why I would ever choose sleep over his company. I forget that we’re somewhere dangerous, and that evil leaders pursue us. His hand is warm and so much bigger than mine. I feel the warmth all the way up my arm, and it’s all I can think about as we walk.

  Cash guides me down long hallways, nodding at guards as we pass. I notice how chins raise, chests puff, and bodies straighten. I never noticed that before, but maybe that’s because I wasn’t looking for it. Now the response to his presence seems obvious.

  We follow a path that takes us up four flights of stairs. At the top, I press a hand to my knee and catch my breath.

  “I’m gonna assume this isn’t an emergency,” I say through gasps. Cash smiles: a thorough, full-hearted smile. I stare at it.

  “No. Not this time. Not yet.”

  Not yet.

  “This way,” Cash says, pulling me toward a metal door. It squeals when he opens it. We step out into the cold night air, and my breath catches. We’re on the roof.

  Soldiers are everywhere. Watchers who aren’t Watchers anymore. Practiced killers who have turned their guns to the Council. At least a dozen patrol this roof alone. Once again, Cash’s entrance creates a stir. A few of the men salute. Cash only nods, barely fazed by the reactions.

  “Over here.” He leads me to an area far from the low walls that border the rooftop. We are somewhere in the center when I slide my back down a wall and sit. Cash lowers to the ground beside me.

  “I’m surprised you haven’t looked up yet,” he murmurs.

  I still. For nineteen years, the night sky has been nothing but gray disappointment. But the sun is out during the day now, which means—

  Slowly my neck arches back. I’m on my feet again. Cash might be following me, but I’m not sure. I don’t know. I can’t see anything but that bright, white orb in the sky. It’s so clear, so bright, I can see gray swirls and details from its surface. This is the moon.

  I turn slow, taking in every inch of bare sky. There’s something else up there. The wind kicks up, but I barely feel it.

  “What are those?” I breathe. Sleep is gone. All of me is awake.

  “Those are stars.”

  I shiver. I didn’t know he was that close. His voice is quiet and kind, next to my ear. Energy flutters in my chest.

  “Stars,” I repeat, trying the word on for size. They are like the shimmering dust that women somewhere outside these mountains brush over their skin. I remember cleaning it at the cosmetic factory. The bottle has toppled and spilled, the diamond-like specs pouring across the sky. And they are much more beautiful against the deep, dark sky than they ever were on skin. The longer I stare, the more layers of stars I see. Infinite. That’s a word I only remembered just now.

  Love is infinite, Norma said. I was twelve, and already the bitterness had latched on, eating at my heart one tiny piece at a time.

  You’re the only person I love, I said, glaring at the glass of her unit window. And Albert. No one else.

  That won’t always be enough, she replied, a hand stroking the length of my hair. Love is powerful. Much more powerful than all your hatred.

  I doubt it, I muttered.

  It’s true. Hate is destructive. To yourself and those around you. But love. Her eyes closed. Love can rebuild what hate destroyed. It’s powerful.

  She smiled at me.

  I hope you get to see that someday.

  A gust of wind blows over the rooftop, and we huddle against the wall again. I press into Cash’s arm. He shifts and takes my hand, pulling my arm beneath his.

  My friend the Watcher.

  “It’s amazing,” I murmur, still glued to the sky. I have that fear still, the one that says these beautiful moments will soon be covered in smog, so I should enjoy them, but only a little. Too much and I’ll feel the devastation when it’s over. We sit in silence.

  It’s different, leaning against Cash. When Edan drops an arm over my shoulders, or sits so close I can barely move, I don’t think about it. It is easy to be near him. But this close to Cash, my weight entirely dependent on his, I’m constantly aware of it. I’m thinking about how I should shift a little, so I don’t seem rigid. I should say something. I’m wondering if he can feel my heart drumming.

  I can feel his.

  “I patrolled these streets,” Cash says, nodding his head once. “These ones. Around this factory. This is where I was assigned for the last two years.”

  “Is it normal to be in one place that long?”

  “Not for me. But my superiors seemed to enjoy watching me struggle.” He spits the words like he hates the taste.

  “Why?”

  “Because I challenged them.”

  He stands, our arms unlinking, falling apart. I push off the ground and follow him to where he stands by the edge of the roof. He presses his hands to the low wall that reaches to his waist. His fingers tense and curl, and I wonder who he’s hurting with them. I stand quiet a foot to his right. The cold wind tangles in my hair, pressing against us, telling us to go back in—where it’s safe. I lean forward, looking down, where the moonlight glistens across the glass-littered street. I wait. On the outside, I try to look calm and interested. But inside I am coiled and tense. I want to know these things. I want to understand what Cash’s life has been. But I am afraid. Will it change how I see him? I don’t want it to change.

  “My first winter here,” Cash says. “There were a large number of Outcasts. More
than I’d seen in other sectors.” His hands press harder into the wall, head falling forward, his expression bitter.

  “This is a sector for manufacturing clothes,” he says. “An entire wing just for coats. But these Outcasts were freezing to death.”

  I close my eyes and wrap my arms around my middle, as if that will lessen the sting. Selfish me, trying to shield myself from his pain.

  “Within days, dozens of Outcasts were dying. They were just…lying there, blue and shaking.”

  Cash balls his hands into fists, pressing into them. He raises his left hand and punches the cement. Hard. Straightening, he turns to me. I want to take his hand, to check his knuckles after what he just did. But I don’t. Instead I stare up at his face, because it’s challenging me.

  “They made us shoot them.” He says it angry, like he knows that this will change things. He knows that telling me this will throw a wall between us. I won’t be able to forgive him. He says it like he knows that. I feel like he’s forcing me to hear this. But I don’t mind. I don’t mind, because I expected this. I know what Watchers are now. They are slaves, with guns and muscle.

  He stabs his chest with his finger. “I killed them.” He takes a step forward, leaning in to force eye contact. “Not the cold. Not the snow. Me.”

  “You didn’t have a choice,” I breathe. I will not look away, even though tears are trying to leak from my eyes, and that will probably make him feel worse. “The Council, they—”

  I stop there. That is where the words end, because I know that what I’m saying isn’t right. Cash’s features soften, but he doesn’t pull back. He looks at me, every inch of my face, and says quietly, “There is always a choice. I chose wrong.”

  He backs away, turning to the darkness that stretches across the valley. He stares off, and I see the pain, the defeat. Releasing the truth is supposed to be freeing. But Cash looks like he’s just drunk poison and is waiting for death.

  I place a hand on the wall for support. The wind and cold and truth are all pushing at me from every side. I stare at the white band Cash wears on his bicep. My heart tries to beat its way out of my chest.

  “Why a feather?” I whisper. Cash releases a heavy breath, fingers rubbing over his sore knuckles. He doesn’t look at me.

  “Because the next time they gave me orders like that,” he says quietly. “I refused. I was flogged. I passed out, and when I woke up, they’d marked me.”

  “But why—”

  “It means I am a coward.”

  “But I thought that the Council punishes the families? I thought that any insubordination was taken out on them.” I think of Edan’s sister, and a knot forms in my chest.

  “I told you,” Cash says. “I don’t have a family.”

  I look down, searching for something to say. What’s the right thing? What would Norma say? I close my eyes, and we stand like this for a long time. It’s hard to hold back the images of Cash, his gun aimed at dying Outcasts. It’s hard to refuse that he did those things. That he aimed and fired, his own finger pulling the trigger. Those were my people. And they are dead. But I don’t hate him for it. Maybe I should, but I don’t feel hate. It is something else.

  I left them, Cash said, the day we stole the medicine. I left them, because they do not own me. I will not…perform for them anymore.

  He chose wrong. But that wasn’t the last choice he made. I shake my head. No, he is not a coward. He left them. He refused. No, not a coward. Something much braver.

  I step forward, and my movement startles Cash out of his own stare. He turns to me, and this time his eyes are no longer angry. They are sad and broken, and the same feelings wash over me. Hatred is destructive, Norma said. And I see it, all over his face. In this pale moonlight, I can see tears sitting in his eyes. The mighty Watcher, crying over the blood he shed.

  I take his hand, the one with scraped, bloody knuckles. I brush my shaking fingers along the skin around the wounds. Cash sucks in a quiet breath. But this is stalling. The thing I want to do is scarier than this. It means releasing my grip on everything I’ve ever believed. It means I am changed.

  My heart racing, I place my hands on his shoulders. He watches me, nervous, breathing shallow. This space between us is the wall, and I must tear it down. Tears freezing on my face, I rise to my toes and pull him to me, until the emptiness between us is gone. I wrap my arms around his neck and bury my face in the curve of his shoulder. After a second, his arms fold around my back, drawing me closer.

  I say the thing that maybe no one has ever said.

  “I forgive you,” I whisper, a knot in my throat. “You’re not a coward. You’re brave. You left them, remember?” I pull back to look him in the eyes. The eyes that are wet with spilling tears. My hands touch either side of his face, and he struggles to look at me. “They don’t own you anymore.”

  I think of the men who killed my parents when I say it. I wonder what side they have chosen.

  Cash doesn’t say anything. I don’t think he can. But when his eyes finally connect with mine, he looks at me like he can’t believe it; like he can’t believe that I’m real. His eyes are so earnest, open. This close, I see the freckles that dust the skin below his eyes and across his nose. It makes me wonder how I ever saw him as a threat. He leans down, and my eyes fall closed when he brushes his lips to my cheek. His temple touches mine.

  “Thank you,” he whispers.

  24

  I stand in the doorway of the office, the one with the clean mirror. Aspen stands before the mirror, knuckles white where she grips the sink. I wish I could bring all the Workers in here, to show them what Takeshi showed me. I expected Aspen to have more of a reaction, but she barely shows any emotion. She doesn’t cry like I did. The only hint at her feelings is the way she chews her mouth.

  “Well?” I say after a while. Her reflection glances at me, and my lips twitch into a careful smile. She looks back to the glass.

  “I look like my dad,” she says flatly, before pushing past me and barreling through the office. I flip off the light and hurry to catch up. In the hall, I reach for her arm. She spins around, arms crossed, glaring at the floor.

  “Aspen,” I say, reaching for her arm again, but stopping short. She doesn’t look like she wants to be touched. “I don’t understand. I thought you wanted to see.”

  “I did,” she mutters. Her head shakes. “I just thought…just whatever.”

  “You hoped you looked more like your mother?” I guess. I know I’ve nailed it when her arms fall limp to her sides and she shrugs. I struggle to know what to say. I’m not sure if it’s appropriate to ask about her father. Maybe asking would be rude. Insensitive. But she’s just standing there, and I can’t deny the instinct to help her.

  “What is he like?” I don’t say was. But I assume he’s dead. Most people are.

  Tears pool in Aspen’s eyes, but the second they slip down her cheeks, she swipes them gone with her shirt sleeve. She sniffs hard. When her eyes lose focus, I know that she’s remembering. I’ve worn that look many times.

  Her eyebrows lower. “Mom was more afraid of him than she was of the Watchers,” she scoffs. “One time she screamed so loud a Watcher came through the door. So stupid. Like they care if something’s wrong.”

  “What happened?” I whisper. I want to say it louder, but I feel suddenly drained, the way I felt when I learned that the Council is poisoning Watcher families.

  “Nothing. Mom’s nose was bleeding, and she had a cut.” She runs her fingers along a cheekbone of her face. “The Watcher said to keep it down. He just…left.”

  My silence is stupid. It’s insulting after what she’s shared. But I didn’t know there were fathers like that. I can’t imagine my father drawing a scream from my mother. The thought makes me nauseous. I open my mouth to say something, but I’m just stammering, worthless noises flopping out.

  “Whatever,” Aspen mutters. She flops her arms like she’s trying to make the moment casual. “He’s dead.”

&n
bsp; I watch helplessly as she walks away, barely a teenager, still a child. Fourteen years is long enough to understand how things work here is what she said on the first day. I feel so foolish.

  The words are still gone two hours later when I’m walking the streets with Takeshi and Cash. Takeshi invited me along on a routine sweep of the area. I said yes, because I never turn down an opportunity to breathe fresh air. I haven’t said anything since we stepped outside, and Cash keeps glancing at me. I know he is probably misinterpreting my silence, but there’s nothing I can do about it. I keep picturing my father’s fist cracking against my mother’s jaw.

  Takeshi peers down the street through the scope of his rifle. When he lowers it, he says, “So tell me about tomorrow, Hannah.” He glances back at me, and when our eyes meet, I know that my silence is bothering him too. But I’m numb today. I tell my left foot to step after my right foot lands. That is all I’m good for.

  “Tomorrow…” I start, scrambling for an answer. I know what he’s getting at. Tomorrow is supposed to be the hope. The reason this is all worth it. But now I see my mother pleading with my father, her hands raised to guard her bleeding face. I didn’t know. I didn’t know there were Workers like that.

  “Hannah?”

  I’ve stopped walking. I don’t remember deciding to do that. Cash is in front of me now, peering down with worry pinching at his eyebrows.

  “What is it?” he asks carefully. “What’s wrong?”

  All of it. Everything is wrong about this world. Watchers killing Workers. Workers beating their families. Eight-year-olds left orphans by men who are trying to save their own children. Beautiful red-haired girls learning they resemble their abusive fathers. All of it, I think. All of it is wrong.

  I’ve been standing here too long. I’m a jerk for making Cash worry. It isn’t his confessions that are haunting me. It is Aspen and the things that her young eyes have seen. I know what it is to fear the men who police the streets. I don’t know what it is like to fear the man who waits to greet you when you arrive home every night. The one who is supposed to stroke your hair and tell you that the sky is blue. I wish I could share those feelings with her. Share my father. I think of Aspen’s mother, how silent she is, and I get it. She is still unwinding after years without a safe place.